Union Telecom Minister Manoj Sinha has said works worth Rs 150 crore have been allotted to BSNL under the smart city projects and the state-run firm has many bigger opportunities in the near future.

Also, it has other projects like network for spectrum (NFS) and fibre to the home (FTTH) -- laying of optical fibre to homes, which give it an advantage, Sinha said.

"BSNL has many bigger opportunities in near future other than mobile telephony. Many tenders have been finalised for 2G, 3G and 4G services. Market share of BSNL has been improved from 7.6 per cent to 9.43 per cent which is commendable. BSNL can play significant role in smart city projects, NFS and FTTH. Works worth Rs 150 crore has been allotted to BSNL under smart city projects, which can be taken as an advantage," Sinha said at the 'Heads of Circles Conference' of BSNL on May 11.

The network for spectrum too is a big project under which BSNL is building optical fibre base communication network for defence with an outlay of around Rs 23,000 crore.

"The field officers of BSNL should focus on better customer service and try to change the negative customer perception about BSNL," he said.

Telecom Secretary Aruna Sundararajan underlined the need of BSNL to be aggressive and innovative.

She said that BSNL is a key partner in BharatNet implementation and has increased market share as well.

"Smart thinking and smart implementation at this stage will be an edge for BSNL," she said.

Sundararajan said that government has deliberately re-named the National Telecom Policy as National Digital Communication Policy (NDCP) 2018 which aims to provide broadband for all.

The objective is that every citizen of India must have broadband of 10 mbps speed by 2022.

"BSNL has a clear lead and advantage. While we realise the target of installing five million wi-fi hotspots by 2020 and 10 million hotspots by 2022, as mentioned in the draft NDCP 2018. Fifty per cent of household in India will have FTTH," she said.

BSNL Chairman and Managing Director Anupam Shrivastava said that there is tough competition in the telecom sector these days.

"Even in this turbulent times, BSNL could not only face the competition head on by matching tariff by tariff and even at times proactively coming up with bold, innovative, unlimited data and voice plans. This has helped BSNL to increase its market share as well as remain MNP positive," Shrivastava said.